Is Steve Gibson A Fraud ?
 

What do you think of Steve Gibson. www.grc.com

A good software engineer thats clued up or a spin doctor thats full of BS ?

I have taken apart some of his code and its pretty good. I must admit that he does overdo things a tad... !

Your thoughts please !

Re: Is Steve Gibson A Fraud ?
 

I have no idea :( - but I still check my systems security on his site...

Any better recommendations.

Re: Is Steve Gibson A Fraud ?
 

I use both grc and dslreports for my scans.... The dsl reports site has a more comprehensive scan but you have to pay for it....

Saying that I have never got conflicting results !

Re: Is Steve Gibson A Fraud ?
 

An alternative view, if somewhat jaundiced, can be found here, it makes interesting reading.



http://grcsucks.com/

Re: Is Steve Gibson A Fraud ?
 

Sure does.... Some of the coments on there are a bit unfair IMHO...

Re: Is Steve Gibson A Fraud ?
 

I'm with diligaf on this one. I don't know enough about the field to comment technically but I have always found grc to be useful.

Re: Is Steve Gibson A Fraud ?
 

I really can't judge as I lack the relevant knowledge, but I've read both sites in the past. The grcsucks site makes very valid points regarding the amount of spin and writing on the GRC site. On the other hand Steve Gibson must do something right, and seems to at least make people aware of some of the issues in internet security? And he provides a free service, which I believe is quite popular?

Re: Is Steve Gibson A Fraud ?
 

One thing I used to like when I was on dial up was the tiny downloads, due to the code he was using, all his utilities took seconds to download.

Re: Is Steve Gibson A Fraud ?
 

I've put "Not sure", because, as stuartbe says, he does seem pretty clued up, but he does tend to produce a lot of BS as well.

Re: Is Steve Gibson A Fraud ?
 

Having used his software in the past & finding it worked exceedingly well aslo using his freeware & site for info I think I'd go for his side of things.
He knows more than me about it all.

Re: Is Steve Gibson A Fraud ?
 

Got to admit - his web pages are nicely coded !

Re: Is Steve Gibson A Fraud ?
 

No they're not .. the dude clearly doesn't realise what CSS is.

Re: Is Steve Gibson A Fraud ?
 

He does write his own webserver though.

Re: Is Steve Gibson A Fraud ?
 

I think they are simple and nicely laid out.... No un needed code !

I can see your point though !

What do you think to his security testing tools ?

Re: Is Steve Gibson A Fraud ?
 

The GRC Custom Hybrid NanoProbe Engine? Yeah .. *ahem*

Re: Is Steve Gibson A Fraud ?
 

I'm with attrition.org, one of my favourite site's. I've never used anything from grc.com.

Re: Is Steve Gibson A Fraud ?
 

I take it you dont think a lot of it m8 ? :D

Do you ever use it ?

Re: Is Steve Gibson A Fraud ?
 

I was being sarky..

Re: Is Steve Gibson A Fraud ?
 

:erm: Sorry, in which case, we agree

Re: Is Steve Gibson A Fraud ?
 

Er no, I don't think anyone in the known world apart from Steven Gibson does, most people prefer to use a real web server.

Re: Is Steve Gibson A Fraud ?
 

Nope - I meant the security tests !

Re: Is Steve Gibson A Fraud ?
 

Actually, the thing that worries me is the SpinRite program.

Now, totally ignoring the people I know who have lost data to this program, it still worries me. Why? It's a program that works directly on the structure of a disc, yet has been at version 5 since at least 1999. Disc technology has changed quite a bit since 1999.

Re: Is Steve Gibson A Fraud ?
 

No, any security test that thinks a freshly installed copy of Xp running it's own inbuilt XP firewall is leak proof needs disassembling and recycling as a hentai game!

Re: Is Steve Gibson A Fraud ?
 

Thats very true !!!! Did try it once but I was a bit concerned that it needed dos to run and did not use its own OS.

Re: Is Steve Gibson A Fraud ?
 

I have never used the leak test thingy myself....

What is it suposed to do ?

Re: Is Steve Gibson A Fraud ?
 

Steve's good at marketing himself, but in my opinion he's full of it.
Here's an example: http://www.theregister.co.uk/content/archive/24189.html

Re: Is Steve Gibson A Fraud ?
 

LOL - they dont think much of the system do they :)

Re: Is Steve Gibson A Fraud ?
 

Did you all realise that Hackers worked out a way to use ShieldsUP! as a hacking tool? http://www.theregister.co.uk/content/archive/23033.html

Re: Is Steve Gibson A Fraud ?
 

I read something about some dude using it to scan IP addresses of his choice, of course Gibson being a spacktard did nothing about it ....

Re: Is Steve Gibson A Fraud ?
 

OK, my 2¢... I believe he is very clued up, but he's also a gob-shÃÃâ€*’ÂÂÂÂ*te. I think he's actually kinda dangerous because he becomes popular with the average PC user as he cleverly uses non-techie language to introduce techie terms. He's loved by certain media (Tech TV for example, but that's kinda a joke anyway) cause he's so opinionated - however check out the radio interview where he was on the same show as the guy from The Register. When he's up against someone who knows their stuff, he becomes an easy target ;)

Oh, and I won't use his tools - even if they are free! ;)

Re: Is Steve Gibson A Fraud ?
 

OMG - just read the article about using his tools to do a DoS - all I can say is..... Bwahahahahahaha :D :D :D

Re: Is Steve Gibson A Fraud ?
 

Some of the stuff on Steve Gibson's site is useful. Some less so, and yes, he's a bit (no, maybe a lot!) paranoid. I think "The Register" has a definite anti-GRC slant, and Steve Gibson is very good spin doctor. I think the truth is somewhere in between.